Valtteri Bottas: “It’s the next two days that count”

Valtteri Bottas will be working on improving his performance on the Ultrasoft Pirelli tyres ahead of Saturday’s final free practice, but feels only fine tuning will need to be done to be competitive this weekend at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.

The Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team racer was third fastest in first practice on Friday morning and then fourth fastest in the afternoon, but after the struggles the team faced in Monaco two weekends ago, he was much positive about their chances this weekend after finding fewer issues with their tyre warm-up.

Although the important running is on Saturday and Sunday, Bottas heads into the weekend having enjoyed his Friday running in Canada, and he is hopeful of a competitive weekend to come.

“After Monaco it was really nice to start this weekend with a positive feeling from the car,” said Bottas. “I think that we are looking quite competitive here, but it’s only practice.

“After practice two, it’s clear we still have a bit more work to do with the Ultrasoft tyre to get more lap time out of those. But the car felt good on the Soft tyres that I tried.

“We’ll focus on finding that edge of extra performance from the Ultrasoft and fine-tuning the set-up overnight. Otherwise I really enjoyed it and had good fun out there, but it’s the next two days that count.”